Case Study

Robert Maxwell was a British media tycoon and Member of Parliament (MP). He was born in poverty in the Czech Republic, fought with the Free Czech army during the Second World War and received the British Military Cross for his bravery on the battlefield. Subsequently, he became an international publishing baron and started his own publishing company Pergamon Press. In the early 1970s, he was investigated by the authorities in the United Kingdom (UK) for the failure of his company Pergamon Press, and following the investigations, he was designated by the authorities in UK as a person who could not be relied upon to exercise the stewardship of any public listed company in the UK.

However, despite that he subsequently succeeded in building up a media empire which included two public listed companies, Maxwell Communication Corporation and Mirror Group of Newspapers. However, he was later found dead in mysterious circumstances in 1991. He was alleged to have used his dominant position as Chairman of the Trustees of the Maxwell Groups pension funds to siphon off monies for his other private interests and was also involved in an illegal scheme to bolster the share prices of companies within his Maxwell Group. In the end, his holding companies went bankrupt, and the Maxwell Group collapsed. It was estimated that 763 million pounds sterling were plundered from his two public listed companies and their pension funds to prop up Robert Maxwells private interests.

You are required to write a report which should include the following information:

1. Discussion of any five appropriate lessons from an overall corporate governance perspective arising from this scandal.